


will you shoulder the weight of my affection

by 1000ft



Series: hey arizona [7]
Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: Confessions, Fluff, Local Gay Has No Time for Symbolism, M/M, Mutual Pining, nonbinary pidge, the void of space
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-02-20
Updated: 2018-02-20
Packaged: 2019-03-21 14:46:20
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,323
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13743183
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/1000ft/pseuds/1000ft
Summary: “I’m going to tell him today, Pidge,” Keith says. One arm is thrown over his eyes, and he can’t see Pidge from where they’re curled up on their chair, but he hears something that sounds like their forehead meeting the workbench.Same, Keith thinks.





	will you shoulder the weight of my affection

The floor of the research bay is a few floors above the central thrusters of the castle. The metal is like heated tile under his back.

 

“I’m going to tell him today, Pidge,” Keith says. One arm is thrown over his eyes, and he can’t see Pidge from where they’re curled up on their chair, but he hears something that sounds like their forehead meeting the workbench.  _ Same _ , Keith thinks. 

 

“You,” they say, voice muffled, “are the most disastrous gay I’ve ever met.” 

 

That’s...that’s a fair point. Keith can’t argue against it when he’s been sneaking around the castleship for days now, using every sliver of stealth training he has to avoid his disastrously large crush on Lance. 

 

Keith rolls over to bury his face in his arms and groan. It just--it wasn’t fair. Cosmically, it was not fair that Lance could make soft, affectionate expressions in his direction with only the smallest bit of color high in his cheeks, but the second Keith so much as  _ thought _ about smiling at Lance or making eye contact or  _ holding hands _ his face burned to the point of his internal temperature skyrocketing and liquefying his brain. 

 

Or something.

 

A stray bolt clatters onto the ground next to his folded arms. Pidge huffs under her breath as if she’d been actually aiming to hit him. “Considering you said the same thing yesterday, I’m not giving you a pep-talk, if that’s what you’re here for. Literally everyone knows that you two are into each other by now, Keith, so just get your ass in gear and, like. Kiss him or whatever.” 

 

“Easier said than done,” Keith says to the floor. Another bolt bounces off his head. 

 

“Get out of my lab, disaster gay.” 

 

-

 

Keith makes a lot of mistakes. 

 

He is fully ready to admit most of his mistakes. He’s aware enough to try to learn from them, to apologize for them, and to fix whatever happens as a result of said mistakes. Keith did not plan to make the mistake of running into Lance as soon as he left Pidge’s lab.

 

He has to rehearse the conversation and possible outcomes of said conversation, okay? The other paladins made sure to remind Keith that he rushed into things more often than not; maybe that was because he knew thinking about them led to  _ over _ thinking, but...whatever. 

 

Keith runs into Lance as he walks past the kitchen. 

They lock eyes. Keith’s face flushes--fucking,  _ dammit, really? Eye contact and you lose it? _ \--and swears he can hear the whistling of tumbleweeds blowing between them. 

 

Keith swallows hard the same time Lance says, “Oh, hey, stranger.”

 

He expects Lance to be mad at him for avoiding him; there are only so many people on the ship, and everyone runs into everyone else at least once a day. Keith hasn’t spoken to Lance in three.

 

Lance lifts an eyebrow when Keith doesn’t speak. Keith swallows again. 

 

“Uh...you okay, dude? You look a little r--” 

 

“Can we talk?” Keith blurts. His hands twitch like they want to cover his face as soon as his mouth clicks shut.  _ Might as well do it now _ , the part of his brain that is  _ not _ impulse control says.

 

If Lance is surprised, he hides it with a single raised eyebrow and a quick “come on, let’s go somewhere else.”

 

-

 

Lance leads him to the upper east observation deck in silence. Keith thinks that if he has to deal with the sound of their syncing footsteps for much longer he’s going to start yelling his affections. 

 

“I’m sorry for avoiding you,” he tells Lance’s shoulder. Keith is surprised his voice doesn’t crack, and he meets Lance’s eyes when he looks away from the control panel that will let them into the room.

 

“Yeah, that kind of sucked, but I figured you had a good reason for it. Warn me next time, though, cool?”

 

“Yeah,” Keith shoves his hands into the back pocket of his jeans. The stiffness in Lance’s shoulders as he strolls into the room gives him away in ways his light words don’t. Keith follows as the other flops onto the couch curving around the center of the room. 

 

Outside and above, the planet they’re orbiting for the time being takes up most of the view. Keith sits close enough to Lance that he can smell the not-citrus of his shampoo but far enough away that Lance can’t see him sweating. Hopefully. 

 

They sit in silence watching the planet below for what feels like ages. 

 

_ You started this, _ Keith’s horrible brain reminds him.  _ You owe him this much for avoiding him, and if he’s changed his mind, then you get over it and move on.  _

 

Even if it crushes you. 

 

Keith clears his throat. “I didn’t, uh, really have a good reason for avoiding you.”

 

“Then why did you?” Out of the corner of his eye, Keith can see that Lance has his gaze on his knees, picking at the seam of his jeans with shaking fingers. Maybe, Keith thinks, he can do this if Lance is just as nervous as he is. 

 

“I needed to...to think--hey, don’t laugh, I am quite capable of thinking--because I…” Keith squints at the windows in front of them. Why were words so terribly, horribly  _ hard?  _ “I like you a lot, as in I want to be more than friends, and I know we started off not really being friends, but then we were, and now I-well I think you...uh...I think you like me, too? I mean! I could’ve misinterpreted what you said and--”

 

“I do!” Lance jerks into his vision, hands hovering like he wants to put his hands on Keith’s shoulders. “I do like you! A lot! Like, yeah, more than friends, like you said, so--”

 

“ _ Cool,”  _ Keith exhales, and feels like his lungs both collapse and inflate in the same go. “Doyouwanttobemyboyfriend?” 

 

He finally meets Lance’s stupidly blue eyes and watches him process what Keith thinks feels like a live grenade sitting between them. 

 

Lance blinks once then promptly face plants into Keith’s thigh. If Lance’s nose is squished when Keith jumps in his seat, he doesn’t complain. 

 

“That was,” Lance says, muffled into denim and thigh, “the cutest  _ fucking  _ thing I’ve ever experienced in my life.”  

 

And lifting his head, Lance meets Keith’s eyes again, blue highlighted by the planet spinning undisturbed on the other side of the observation deck window, and says, “Yeah, I want to be your boyfriend.” 

 

Keith almost wants to put a hand to his chest to make sure his heart is still beating; it certainly feels like all the blood in his body is stuck in his head and making him stupidly dizzy. The smile that tugs the corner of his mouth feels like the best kind of shocked happiness he’s probably ever felt. 

 

This particular brand of relief is something Keith’s sure he’s never felt. 

 

Lance’s grin is goofily lopsided. “What’s the look for, Red?”

 

“What look?”

 

“The  _ I’m stunned into disbelief _ look.”

 

Keith snaps his mouth shut--his jaw might’ve dropped, but so what? He is stunned. The ridiculous man in front of him actually likes him back. They’re apparently  _ boyfriends _ now? Twenty-one years old and confessing like twelve year olds.  _ Boyfriends. _

 

“I’m just,” Keith looks down to where Lance’s hand rests on his thigh. He’s still leaning in towards Keith, eyes locked on his face instead of on his knees, fingers picking at a loose thread on  _ Keith’s   _ jeans now. “You seriously want to date me?”

 

“Uh,  _ yeah? _ The only reason I didn’t ask you first is because I wasn’t sure if  _ you  _ liked  _ me.” _

 

Keith rubbed at the back of his neck. “Oh. Well. Thanks, for...you know.” 

 

The entirety of his face feels like the skin is about to blister. Is there a limit to how much someone can blush? Keith looks at Lance out of the corner of his eyes, just in time to catch the shit-eating grin breaking out on his face. 

 

Oh, shit. 

 

“Hey, Keith, babe, why do you like me?” 

 

Oh, Keith can play this game. His face is already a flushed disaster, and he’s never grown out of knocking Lance’s flirting game down a peg, so, really, what does he have to lose. He’s always been honest to a T, right?

 

“Easy _.  _ You’re a good pilot, a lethal long-range fighter, you’re selfless even though you try to hide it, y-y--” fuck, maybe this wasn’t that easy. Keith keeps his eyes on his knees but casually throws the arm closer to Lance over the back of the couch. He won’t lose whatever this is, dammit. “--you’re good with people, great diplomat.”

 

Keith can feel Lance still beside him. He doesn’t think he’s breathing anymore. 

 

“You keep everyone smiling,” Keith continues, “and you’ve grown a lot in the time we’ve been out here. I know you miss your family, you love them, and I think you’re a bit in love with the universe. You’re...Lance, you’re beautiful. And you’re eyes are…” Keith turns to meet Lance’s wide-eyed stare. Keith was right. He isn’t breathing. 

 

Lance’s face is, he thinks, almost as red as Keith’s. 

 

“And you’re eyes are indescribably gorgeous.” 

 

A few seconds of silence stretch between them, and to Keith’s great amusement, Lance spends those seconds opening and closing his mouth. Like a fish. Like a...cute fish or whatever. Keith is too satisfied for proper symbolism. 

 

Eventually, Lance settles with a choked, “t-that was really gay, Keith.” 

 

-

 

“Come here.” 

 

Keith slides onto the floor where Lance sits with his back against the observation deck couch. Lance shakes his head before he can settle. 

 

“No, come  _ here.”  _ And pats the space between his spread legs as if that’s not going to completely render Keith functionless. 

 

Seeing him freeze, Lance wiggles his fingers at him. “Hey, it’s just me. I wanna hold my boyfriend and look out this giant ass window at the void.” 

 

With a sharp, startled laugh, Keith acquiesces, sinking down between Lance’s legs and leaning slowly--god, how was he so warm?--into his chest. Keith can feel Lance’s heartbeat through both their shirts, a steady rhythm against his back, and long arms curl around Keith’s waist. 

 

Keith’s heart stutters in his chest, and he’s sure Lance can feel it in the way his breath catches, or in the tightening of his stomach, or the way his shoulders relax as if they were meant to be in Lance’s arms. His nerves are still there, never left, but they’re not swarming quite so violently in his stomach.

 

Lance tucks his cheek next to his, chin propped on his shoulder, and they watch look out of the giant ass window at the void. 

  
-

 

It’s at this point, with Lance’s arms securely around his waist, that Keith realizes that he doesn’t know as much about Lance as he wants to. He knows about his family, his insecurities, what he sounds like when he thinks he’s not going to make it out of a mission, but...Keith’s never asked his favorite color (red), or his favorite animal (sharks), or his favorite smell (honeysuckle). Keith doesn’t know the smaller things that fill the gaps that is the puzzle of Lance McClain. 

 

Keith knows that Lance likes video games, but only the ancient ones, simple 8-bit fighting and fantasy. Keith tells Lance about the phase he went through in middle school that involved mythology, folklore, and an unhealthy amount of time spent reading. Lance tells him about his summers spent in the ocean, when he broke his arm falling out of a tree, the way he’d cried when he got accepted into the Garrison on a full scholarship. 

 

In return, Keith runs pale fingers up and down Lance’s forearms, tracing veins and the curve of bone and grins every time Lance inhales a little sharper than the breath before, or stops talking altogether to stare down where they’re curled into each other.

 

In return, Keith tells Lance about his father, the way he’d disappeared without the closure of telling Keith  _ why  _ he left, if he was even alive. Lance’s arms tighten around him when he talks about the phantom bruises on his upper arms, from a grip that was too strong, the whisper of memory of learning to keep tears at bay, to make his expression fall flat when his blood boiled to hit back at someone Keith was supposed to be able to _ trust _ . 

 

They go back and forth with things they’ve gotten up to with friends and siblings. Lance convincing his older sister to buy him alcohol at seventeen, their mother finding out and making sure the day after saw her hungover son in the loudest, movement-filled environment possible. Keith shatters Lance’s perception of Golden Boy Takashi Shirogane, the way Keith flung food at Montgomery in calculus and never got caught, sneaking out onto any roof within walking distance to watch the stars. 

 

Keith admits that he hated the desert. Lance promises to take him to the beach. That sand is much more enjoyable, anyway. 

 

-

 

“Hey.” Lance threads his fingers through Keith’s as they leave the observation deck. “Are we going to tell the rest of the team? That we’re dating?”

 

Keith eyes him. He can’t find it in himself to glare, with the way Lance’s thumb is rubbing circles into the back of his hand, but that’s neither here nor there. They could make an announcement, if Lance wanted, and pretending they weren’t together would just be headache because, honestly…

 

“...they probably think we already are, don’t they?”

 

Keith squeezes his hand. “Yeah, pretty much.”  

 

“I guess we’ll figure it out as we go, huh.” 

  
Keith  _ hmms  _ in content agreement. There’s no one in the hallway to see the feather-light kiss Lance presses to the crown of his temple, but Keith will feel the warmth of lips on his skin for hours.

**Author's Note:**

> heyho I dunno what's going on at any given time so thanks.


End file.
